You can set up your site either through WordPress.com or WordPress.org. The main difference between the two is that WordPress.com sites are officially hosted by WordPress and wordPress.org sites are self hosted. So while you can get a site up and running online for absolutely no cost with WordPress.com, it has limitations as far as features and what you can do with the site. A major limitation and drawback is that the web address will look like this, www.yourdomainname.wordpress.com, which from a professional standpoint, can be considered less credible. While I would not recommend this option for business websites, it can be a good starting point for anyone getting started with a simple personal blog.

While WordPress.org is also free to use, you will need to supply the hosting service and you will need to purchase a domain name. However, you can easily pick up a domain name for less than $10 per year and hosting for as little as $5-$10 per month. I personally use HostGator for my web hosting and NameCheap as my domain registrar, but GoDaddy is another popular service many choose to use. Although these are added costs, the price you’re paying to get your business website up and running with unlimited freedom and flexibility is really inexpensive and in my opinion, worth every cent of the small investment.

Domain registrars and web hosting companies are fairly competitive with features and cost so who you decide to go with will more than likely be a matter of personal preference. However, I would strongly suggest that you consider using a hosting company that offers Cpanel. Cpanel is a back office application that makes the installation of many website features easy and manageable. If the hosting that you choose also offers Fantastico (which it usually will if it also offers Cpanel) then it just got even easier. Fantastico enables you to install WordPress into the root directory of your website with a few simple clicks of the mouse. Just follow the directions once you login to Cpanel and you are ready to go.

Once the WordPress software is ready to be used on your site, you have the option of making your site look more like a regular static website or having it work like a blog, or both. Depending on what your business is, any of these options will work great and help you to generate traffic.

Presenting a professional site is important and WordPress has many features that make this easy. The variety of themes and templates that are available help your business to be unique, while professionally and creatively showing what you and your business are all about. The use of plugins also adds to your web presence and extends the capabilities of your website for both your visitors and the search engines. There are for example, plugins that can make your website more interactive for your visitors, more secure, and even help with tracking statistics and analytics for better web usage.

WordPress is flexible, easy to install, free to use and is designed for visibility with search engines and your customers. With a growing range of plugins and themes, WordPress makes it easy to build business websites that are interactive, interesting and unique.

Still don’t know where to start? I can help not only build business websites and/or business blogs, but market them so they get indexed by the search engines and found by targeted buying customers.

Peace & Prosperity,

Small Business Websites are becoming a “must have” component to a successful small business internet marketing strategy.  As a small business just getting started, it may seem overwhelming to realize that there are many companies trying to get your hard earned dollars by offering “simple to set up” websites.  Sometimes their offers are tempting, until you realize that any changes you’d like to make or features you’d like to add are always an extra fee.

WordPress to the rescue! WordPress is built on free software that lets you update content yourself, make changes with a few clicks and has a wide variety of professional designs and applications that you can add in a few minutes. While WordPress was originally designed for use as a blogging tool, it has morphed into an incredible Content Management System (CMS) that allows small business owners to create their own professional websites quickly without a lot of technical knowhow.

Let’s take a look at 7 benefits to creating your small business website using WordPress:

1. Save yourself some cash.  Did you know that you can use the WordPress software for free?  What you will need to pay for is hosting, but you can find hosting for around $5-$10 per month.  Many hosting companies also have specials for the first month or discounts for paying for several months up front.  Otherwise, you can build your site using WordPress for free.
2. Easy set-up. No more headaches trying to set up your site.  WordPress is easy to install as many hosting companies have Fantastico.  This software lets you click a button, and WordPress is installed.  Often, the hosting companies also offer tutorials on how to use WordPress, or you can find any number of videos and ‘how-to’ guides to get you through and answer your questions on getting your site to look exactly how you want it to.  No technical wizards needed here!
3. Change the look and feel of your wrodpress website anytime.  There are templates, or themes, that you can use to make your website original and unique.  In fact, there are thousands to choose from and most are free.  You can of course choose to pay for a theme, but it is not required.  Also, if you decide to change your theme, you can do so whenever you’d like.  This adds a lot of flexibility to your site as you can change your theme to suit your growing business.
4. Change what your wordpress website can do with plug-ins.  Plug-ins are software that allow you to do a lot of different things on your website.  There are some that can automatically backup your site, create a sitemap for your visitors to use, help you fight SPAM, allow comments on your posts, and email a message to your visitors asking them to take another look at your site etc.  Oh, and just about all of the plug-ins are free.
5. SEO friendly.  The ball is already rolling for you with SEO.  Search engines love WordPress and are already configured to quickly and easily index WordPress sites.  There are even SEO plug-ins that can help you in getting more search engine attention and helping you in your search engine optimization efforts.
6. Get help when you need it.  With the incredible popularity of WordPress, there are plenty of WordPress experts that have a lot of experience and can help you with just about any problem.  There is a forum at WordPress.org that has great information and is an excellent resource, but you can get help from plenty of other places online as well.  No matter the problem, you won’t be in the dark for long.
7. You maintain control.  One of the most frightening experiences has to be when you realize that someone else is in control of how your business looks or operates.  It can be very frustrating to have to wait and depend on someone else.  With WordPress, you keep control and can add pages, delete pages, move things around, update functionality and can get help or assign someone else to make changes as you see fit.  This can help with peace of mind as much as it can with the growth or flexibility of your business.

WordPress has got to be one of the easiest ways to really create and maintain your small business website and internet presence.  As with anything, there is a bit of learning curve, but with its cost effectiveness and design flexibility, it sure is worth it.

Ask me how I can help you with your WordPress small business website and/or business blog.

Peace & Prosperity,

Blogging is a way to create interest and traffic to the perspective business or web site. Blogging allows a way for the business to announce itself and present information about the business in a creative, informative and interactive way.

Keyword Phrases and Blog Post Titles

Through the use of specific keywords in the blog post titles, you are using search engine optimization (SEO) to draw in traffic via the search engines. Add to that, information and solutions that your readers need, you are driving targeted traffic to your blog and increasing the likelihood of sales. The information presented should be focused, and address a specific need within your audience. Your product or service should then help them resolve that need. This is effective blog marketing.

Use of Images

Photos and graphs are used to illustrate the written information presented in the blog. The result is a dramatically focused and visual approach to draw the readers’ attention. Images just make for a more interesting read.

Compelling Content

When you are writing a blog post, you need to have in mind your objective. What is it that you want to say, what issue or need within your market do you want to address. Once you know the purpose behind your blog post, you write to address that need.

Like any good writing, you should have a compelling title, a beginning, middle and end to your content. Blog posts are generally shorter than articles or other types of written content. While there are no hard and fast rules on length, it’s best to identify their need, discuss the need and then offer a solution within the call to action.

Call to Action

A call to action is used at the end of the post to direct your readers in what you want them to do after they have read your post. The action can be a special sales offer, a discount on your products or services, your affiliate link to an off-site product or service, or even a request for them to leave a comment.

The continued result for the small online business is updated advertising in a way that allows for a greater audience to be reached on the internet, through the use of keywords phrases. The online business can then see a continued return audience as the interest grows.

Are you leveraging the internet with a business blog?


Peace & Prosperity,

P.S. Discover the hidden challenges that may be sabotaging your website presence with a free 30 minute marketing strategy session.

Three Tips to Successful Website Marketing

1)      Blogging. Today, blog software is capable of much more than just blogging your thoughts or posting articles on your site.  Blog software, like WordPress, are capable of also creating static web pages just like any regular website, only they also make it easy for you to maintain your site. But more important than that, using blog software to write blog posts is a traffic magnet, because:

a)      You are writing fresh content, and search engines love to see fresh content, and so do site visitors.

b)      Blog software also has RSS feeds which allow folks to sign up to receive notice whenever you post something new on your site, thus reminding them to come back to your site and read, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will buy.

2)      Social Media. Who hasn’t heard of Twitter, Facebook and all the various social media networking sites available today? Social media networking is another way to build trust with potential clients, but also another avenue to find potential clients, engage them in conversation and then direct them to your website.  Use social media to engage your market; learn what they want and need – then find a way to meet that need. This is also known as relationship marketing.

3)      Mailing List. While many internet marketers will say that ‘the money is in the list’ (which is mostly true), without a website:

a)      You would have no way of getting subscribers to join your mailing list

b)      You would have no place to direct your mailing list subscribers to view your products or services

Successful website marketing is about building a marketing strategy that involves various elements to target your market audience within the various social networking sites, then using blog posts and mailing list contacts to point them back to your home base: your website.

Peace & Prosperity,

P.S. Don’t forget to join our mailing list and subscribe to our RSS feed for more news and tips on internet marketing.

Knowing that you have the potential to reach millions of people all over the world, where better to market your business than online?

However, and this is a BIG however . . . Do Not believe for a second that just because you build a website and get it online, the millions of people searching the internet will come. Quite the contrary, nobody will see it or know it exists until you promote it, tweak it and consistently improve it.

If you’re thinking, “who wants to do MORE work?” Consider this . . . by not marketing your business online, you’re offering your competition a piece of YOUR pie. If you’re not hungry enough to work for the success of your business, your competitors will happily take it from you.

While there are many strategies to website marketing, which we can continue to discuss in the future, here are 5 things you Must Do to your website to start setting yourself up for success.

Set Up an Opt-In Form on Your Site

Place this form on every page of your site where it can easily be seen. When someone visits your website, they’re showing an interest in what you have you offer or what you have to say (information) and may very well provide their name and email to stay informed. To increase the chances of your visitors leaving their name and email, include a clearly stated call to action and entice them with a valuable freebie such as a newsletter or coupons. This simple form is an important piece in building your business online.

Make Sure Your Website is Impressive

What I mean by impressive is simply easy to navigate, easy to understand and easy on the eyes. People who arrive at your site for the first time that have trouble figuring where to go or what the site is about will quickly move on. In order to first get visitors and then keep them coming back to your website, make sure your website content is well-written and let people know what your site or business is all about. Keep your website simple and try to avoid too many distractions as your visitors will find this overwhelming. You’ll also want to stay away from to many flash graphics as it increases the load time and we all know that the longer a site takes to load, the faster your visitor will leaves.

Provide Value

Give your customers what they want by including information and products/services that answers their needs. Focus on the benefits your customers will receive. If your service or product is useful, and you provide stellar customer service, then you’re more than likely going to gain a customer for life. You’re also more likely to get return customers as well as word of mouth referrals.

Optimize Your Website to Work the Search Engines

Your website should at the very least be search engines optimized at a basic level. This would include proper title tags, meta tags, and keywords. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a very effective strategy to apply when striving for search engine ranking, indexing and visibility.

Keep Your List Private

People hate receiving spam email. This means that you should never share your list with third parties or send them junk mail. And always, offer them an obvious and easy way to unsubscribe.
These 5 starter tips are just the beginning when it comes to marketing your website online. If you’d like to continue learning how to effectively market online, come back often or subscribe to my RSS feed. If you’d like to get started right away with setting up and marketing your website online, email me at: Andrea@HighProfitsMarketing.com